January 30, 2004
GILES FILES
By
Duncan Giles
President
NTEU Chapter 49
On this and that...
Well, once again it’s filing season, with all the fun and confusion that
goes with it. It’s become abundantly clear that we are no longer one IRS
but different fiefdoms within the Service.
I understand why W&I Field Assistance doesn’t want anyone to help them
answer questions unless trained (screws up their statistics) and why SB/SE
Field Compliance doesn’t want their employees helping out (less time on case
work), but where is the happy medium?
Back in the old District days, employees in the PODs would work together
and help each other out. But due to the restructuring (except in rare
instances) this is not allowed anymore. How this has made the Service
better escapes me.
A good example of this is the Columbus POD. One of the TRRs retired
at the end of November. That leaves just one TRR there since Field
Assistance, with limited resources, chose not to backfill the position. The
Compliance employees in Columbus (much to their credit) don’t want to leave
the employee and the taxpayers hanging - but their hands are tied.
After discussions with NTEU and others, Field Assistance will send help 1-2
days a week. This example does not seem to bode well for the future
direction of the Service until we get the needed funding to do the proper
hiring across the board.
The South Bend IRS office move, delayed by about 6 weeks (I hope no one fainted
from shock), should take place around the end of January to much upgraded
digs. I’m glad to see them move into the type of space they deserve.
Finally, Chapter 49 has added 3 new stewards as of the first of the year.
Joseph Roberts, Paul Skirvin and Vonda Tyler are stepping up to serve their
fellow employees.
Thanks to the Stewards Committee of Brian Kosteck, Karen McKibben and Cynthia
Underwood for interviewing applicants and making recommendations. If
you are a member and want to help as a steward (or in any other capacity)
let your favorite steward know.
That’s it for now
The South Bend IRS office move, delayed by about 6 weeks (I hope no one fainted
from shock), should take place around the end of January to much upgraded
digs. I’m glad to see them move into the type of space they deserve.
Finally, Chapter 49 has added 3 new stewards as of the first of the year.
Joseph Roberts, Paul Skirvin and Vonda Tyler are stepping up to serve their
fellow employees.
Thanks to the Stewards Committee of Brian Kosteck, Karen McKibben and Cynthia
Underwood for interviewing applicants and making recommendations. If
you are a member and want to help as a steward (or in any other capacity)
let your favorite steward know.
That’s it for now.
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PAY RAISE UPDATE
The pay raise news used to be fairly simple – we get a certain percentage
raise each year at a given point in time. We no longer live in simple
times. Here’s the pay raise news for 2004, with a brief idea on the opening
round of discussion about 2005 pay.
President Bush proposed an average 2% salary hike for civilian federal employees
in calendar year 2004 when he announced his budget to Congress this time
last year. The White House continued to push hard for that raise amount throughout
the budget process. However, a consensus was reached by a bipartisan
group of lawmakers to give civil servants the same average percentage raise
as was proposed for the armed forces, 4.1%. NTEU’s Legislative Department
was heavily involved in creating that consensus, which succeeded in the end
despite intense lobbying by the Bush Administration to give us a much lower
pay raise.
The budget bill was not in place at the end of calendar year 2003, which
left open an opportunity for President Bush to issue an executive order implementing
the lower 2% 2004 average raise, and that is exactly what he did. It was
well known that Congress was poised to enact the higher 4.1% average pay
hike for this year. The White House could have saved the government a lot
of time, trouble and money had it just issued that executive order providing
the 4.1% increase in pay, but it did not. Now we’re faced with the
same situation we had last year. For those with direct deposit, the
February 2 pay will reflect a 1.93% pay increase for IRS workers in the Indianapolis
area and 1.94% for the rest of the state. The one exception is for
those assigned to the Merrillville IRS office - since they are tied to the
Chicago area, their raise will be 2.17%.
Now that the higher average 4.1% pay hike is law, we have to wait for the
locality pay numbers before we know the final pay raise amount this year.
Plus, it will take a while for IRS to implement the higher raise and give
us back pay for the first part of the year.
This could have been avoided if the administration had just implemented the
4.1% raise while the budget bill was being debated in Congress. “Federal
salaries for fiscal year 2004 have to be calculated twice at great expense,”
NTEU National President Colleen Kelley said, “and federal employees
are left to wonder if their contributions are valued by the current administration.”
There is another aspect of this long budget fight that impacts all of us.
IRS and other federal agencies are nearly 4 months into the fiscal year and
are only now getting budget figures. When budgets are approved so late each
year, federal agencies have a much tougher task in hiring and backfilling
staff.
President Bush will be sending his fiscal year 2005 budget proposals to Capitol
Hill soon. Meanwhile, a bipartisan group of lawmakers have called on
the president to continue pay parity, meaning the average raise for the armed
forces and civilian federal workers would be the same. Even if the
White House does not propose pay parity in its budget proposals, the final
decision will rest with Congress. We will keep you informed.
LEAVE BANK
OPEN SEASON
The IRS Leave Bank program is an important employee benefit that has the
strong support of NTEU. Here’s how it works. You contribute one pay
period’s annual leave (4, 6 or 8 hours depending on how much you accrue each
pay). If you face an emergency situation, you may apply with the leave
bank for help. If you signed up for leave bank membership in 2003,
you must renew your membership to enroll in 2004. The open season runs
January 25 through March 5. Complete Form 9058 to enroll. If
you have any questions about the leave bank, talk to your manager or any
Chapter 49 steward.
THERE ARE MANY BENEFITS OF NTEU MEMBERSHIP -
TALK TO A STEWARD
FOR DETAILS